New Delhi, Sept. 21 -- Cashless claim settlement is a key benefit in health insurance, especially when one is afflicted with a cost-prohibitive critical illness, or there is a situation warranting huge medical expenditure. The least an insurer and network provider or hospital can do is to ensure that patients and families are not burdened with financial worries when they are entitled to protection through their health insurance cover.

There may be individual situations where cashless claims are denied. For eg., when a hospital has payments pending from an insurer, or when a particular insurer and hospital are sorting out their pre-agreed tariff rates. However, the recent trend of industry bodies and hospitals facing off under the veil of...